‘Get Bruinann to the gate with a detail to meet us,’ she told Rede, ‘and with a spare shield for me from the armoury.’

  ‘Ma’am?’

  ‘I gave Ylante a direct order,’ Calpurnia growled as she made for the door, ‘and what does she do? She turns and wanders off on her own. Keep your surveillance on her, Rede, but I aim to be there when we move in on her. She can explain to my face what brought this on. Who’s the arbitrator in charge of that squad you mentioned?’

  ‘Oraxi, ma’am–’

  ‘And is Bruinann on alert? I’m going down there with him and with an escort.’ Calpurnia was standing in the doorway, ‘the same size again as whatever Oraxi’s leading. Send word to the Arbites on my dromon for full lockdown. They stay anchored, but they seal themselves in there.’

  Rede nodded and rapid-fired instructions into the vox. Then she looked up at Calpurnia with sharp worry written on her lean brown face.

  ‘What is it?’ Calpurnia was gripping the doorframe, ready to propel herself away.

  ‘Order passed on to the dromon crew, but they report in turn. The hangar has just–’ she listened to the vox again as Calpurnia fidgeted in the doorway. ‘It’s shut down. The lights and engines have been put to sleep. They don’t know where the command has come from.’

  Calpurnia ground her teeth.

  ‘It’s either some plot by Ylante or it’s an ambush. Either way, I’m in a mood to bust someone’s plans wide open. Get whoever you can onto those dock systems; I don’t care if we have to drag Channery out of the Enginarium by her collar. Wake those machines up and find out who put them to bed. We’re on the move.’

  It had been a shock when the lights cut off. Dechene was not used to being in darkness, and he wasn’t sure he could remember the last time he had been on the Bastion’s docking hangars. Suddenly, the big metal space he’d been skulking through was a black maze, hard metal shapes all around him, cables, steps and ridges, making his footing treacherous. He’d spotted dead Otranto’s precious little pet concordiast in the cloisters, and had been curious to see what she had been in such a hurry for. At the worst he had expected that to lead to Renz snarking at him for wasting some time. He hadn’t bargained on this.

  Still, he was rather pleased with the perch he had found for himself. Once his eyes had adapted a little, Dechene had managed to get his bearings and climb up onto an elevated lifter-tray. From here, by the pallid light coming in from the lit passageways at the rear of the hangar, he could see Ylante in her cream gown. She’d been as spooked as he was by the darkness, and was looking around her. Dechene hunkered down to make sure she didn’t see him and then caught his breath. The movement behind Ylante hadn’t been his imagination. He froze, watched and concentrated. Quick, furtive figures, four of them, slipped easily through the darkness.

  Dechene was sure that they were people from Lohjen’s ship. Hard to keep track of – they seemed to lose definition in the shadows, somehow. He was glad they didn’t think to look up. Ylante’s pale clothes glimmered in the dark. Dechene, dressed in the same shade, would stand out like a, well, like something he didn’t want to be, because it would, most likely, get him shot. Ylante, shivering, had put her back to a lifter-column. He watched and waited, wondering when one of the figures would make a move.

  ‘Mamzel Ylante, to us!’

  The shout made Dechene jump, enough to set the lifter tray swinging gently. He gritted his teeth – what if someone heard the chain squeaking? No. He heard two sets of footsteps, no effort at quiet, clattering in from the keep, a wiry dark-haired woman in an artisan’s bodyglove and… and a houseman? A damn laundry cart pusher with his drudges trotting along behind him! Dechene wanted to laugh out loud. Who the hell had sent these people in for the rescue?

  ‘Mamzel Ylante,’ called the woman again. ‘You’re in danger. Please come and stand by us!’ The houseman motioned to his drudges, and one of them directed a heavy hand-lumen into the hangar.

  The hot white beam swung back and forth through the shadows underneath Dechene for a moment, and just when he was sure it would fan up and reveal him, the first two shots went by underneath, snuffing out the light and the boy who held it.

  The house crew scattered, sprinting sideways and forwards into the shadows, as whispered words of combat-cant came up from behind him. Another shot, stub, not las. Dechene inched himself backwards so that the platform wouldn’t sway, and pressed his head down. This would do him fine until the shooting had died down – Dechene could be arrogant, but he wasn’t stupid.

  The spotlight dropped and crashed, and its carrier fell dead on top of it. Suddenly, Torma Ylante was groping through a green-purple haze, a stabbing, pulsing after-image right in the centre of her vision. She squeezed her eyes shut and opened them again, trying to focus on her outstretched hand through the throbbing nova in front of her eyes. Behind her, someone shouted her name again. Ylante gritted her teeth and started towards the sound, sure that, at any moment she’d brain herself on an overhead rail, or break her outstretched fingers on a stanchion. What was going on? She thought she recognised one of the silhouettes as the houseman she had spotted watching her. But that light – had they been looking for her, or deliberately trying to blind her?

  She spotted a shadowy shape in front of her in time to sidestep it and get around it – some kind of machinery, too indistinct for her to get a clear idea of what it was. She wondered if she was safe here. No, wherever the shots had come from, it had been somewhere in the dark. She had to keep moving. She closed her eyes for a moment, opened them, and could see a little better. Move on and just perhaps she could get to cover. That or stay where she was, marooned and alone. No.

  She took a step and her foot came down askew onto a thick snaking cable that sent her staggering sideways, twisting her knee and ankle. Torma Ylante dropped to one knee, fighting to keep in the cry that she knew would bring a bullet out of the darkness.

  ‘Torma Ylante! We’re here to keep you safe!’ shouted Hasta Rhiil, and then immediately danced three steps sideways, scanning the hangar through the tiny darklight monocular that Rede had issued to her. A long-barrelled silenced dartcaster jutted from each sleeve, the spots of light from the black-laser targeters skittering back and forth over the bay, visible only to her. Where the hell had the woman gone? And where were the bastards who’d shot that poor kid with the lamp? She couldn’t see anything moving in the lilac-tinted image the monocular fed her. Were they cowards, or they just smart?

  She darted forwards between two crates, kicked one loudly and cursed theatrically, and then doubled back and around. Nobody seemed to be moving on her. Moans and shouts came from where she had been standing: the rest of those boys were trying to drag their dead companion to cover.

  She tried to let the training take over – the combat training from the arbitrator range, not the endless classroom exercises of the Espionist schools and let her skills work for themselves.

  Throne alone knew what the houseman made of what was happening, but he was being stupidly, loudly brave, helping his crew drag their dead friend behind a track-loader, bawling for the murderer to come out and face him man to man. Rhiil pushed deeper into the hangar, among half-filled containers and abandoned trucking equipment. Where had the woman gone?

  There was a dark human figure against a paler spot of half-shadow, and Rhiil’s arm snapped straight. The point of violet light dropped neatly to the base of its neck and her dartcaster made its barely-there shikshikshik. The figure reeled and clutched at where the shots had hit, but it didn’t fall.

  Rhiil’s eagerness betrayed her. Suddenly, all she could think about was riding her kill and standing over his corpse. She’d save Ylante and hello, full espionist rank, and she could finally wear a proper black carapace again with that wonderful red collar. She ran a few silent paces forwards, but the second assassin had been ready for her and the las-shot exploded in Rhiil’s shoulder, spun her around in mid-stride and mid-air, and dumped her hard on the metal deck as her vision went from purple-shaded dark to utter black.

  Ylante heard the crack of the las-round’s superheated trail and then the ugly sound of a human body falling. She hobbled three steps to another stanchion, but she was clumsy with panic and fell heavily against it, shoulder-first. She slumped there for a moment and then plunged on through the dimness. Stupid, stupid! How had she trusted the letter, but then how could she have known?

  Her chest hit a diagonal support and she grunted, gripped it and lowered herself down, thinking that she could crawl under it and get her breath. Her vision was starting to come back, shapes and distances visible around the livid after-image. If only they could keep fighting each other behind her for just a minute more.

  That was the moment that the gun-barrel hit the back of her head and bounced her off the support. Before her knees had even fully buckled, the man behind her had a fistful of her hair, and she was half-stumbling, half-crawling to try to keep up, as he dragged her away.

  Bello was dead. The poor slack-witted boy hadn’t understood why they had come running down to the hangar, but he’d been so proud when he’d been given the lamp to hold, and now he was dead.

  Goll Rybicker hammered his great fists on the metal deck. He had chosen Bello to hold the lamp, and now Bello was dead. Goll looked at the hole in the boy’s tunic and all he could think was Emperor, please, how can I make this not happen?

  Goll was not bright. He didn’t really understand all the things the Arbites had said to him, that time when he had obeyed his foreman and helped carry some barrels to a storeroom away from the usual commissary compound. He hadn’t understood what was wrong with that, but suddenly there had been Arbites there and his foreman hadn’t ever been seen again, and then people had talked at him in a dark little cell. It had all meant that he had to do things that the secret Arbites messengers wanted him to do, or he would disappear too. That had been about as much sense as he could make of it.

  Goll roared and struck his fists against his face. His voice drowned out the weeping of the other boys. He wanted to get the coward with the gun, but if he ran out, he would be shot, just like Bello. In his rage, dying was something Goll could shrug off, but dying without avenging his boy – a hateful idea!

  Maybe, maybe if he was fast and loud? The shooter was a coward, killing boys and hiding in the dark. Surely, the sight of Goll running at him would make him drop the gun and wriggle away like the worm he was, and Goll could run fast. Right now, he knew he could run like the wind.

  He began to take great, whooping breaths, building himself up for the rush, but already the other boys were looking up from their dead crewmate, as the racket of arbitrator boots came booming down the steps.

  Lead Arbitor Oraxi spared the little knot of people huddled behind the truck. He had more important things to worry about than a handful of cowed drudges, and the paunchy man baying at the hangar roof. The transmission from Rede had instructed them to catch the concordiast, and the last frantic vox from Rhiil said that there was already shooting. That was fine by Oraxi. For the first time in a mind-numbing twenty-one months at the Tower, he had a real operation to lead.

  There were clicks and clanks from above them as the lighting arrays started to warm up. Oraxi and his five arbitrators prowled forwards in three pairs, beams from their shoulder-lumens criss-crossing. The lead arbitor in each pair was ready to volley scattershot, and the man behind him had a body-seeking Executioner round loaded. They advanced through the brightening hangar bay easily and wordlessly, covering open spaces and taking control of sight lines.

  Then the lights began to go out.

  Oraxi had served longer than Rhiil, and his preservation reflexes were better: his legs had already propelled him into cover behind a stack of rolled freight-slings before he looked up. There was nothing broken that he could see, no shots shattering the floodlight glass. They were simply shutting down. Either they were up against someone who could poison the minds of the machine-spirits against them or… but that thought was bad enough, so Oraxi left it there. He listened for a moment, heard no attacks and moved out again, lumen activated, motioning the others forwards. Arbitrator Arkepp prowled at his side, hunting.

  One of her attackers was hurt or dead. Ylante’s head was still ringing, and the blow had sent her vision into blurs and spots again, but the fitful on-off patches of light appearing in the hangar let her see what her captors were doing. Whoever was yanking her along had had to stop while one of his companions, also bodygloved and masked, hoisted a third limp form onto one shoulder.

  ‘Move it, murderess,’ her captor ordered, through a vox-masker that turned the voice into a genderless rasp. ‘You’re in our power. Forget that for a moment and–’ it pushed the gun-muzzle against her forehead, hard enough to make her flinch. ‘No sound, just obey.’

  Ylante’s thoughts were too jumbled to question the weapon pointed at her face, and she mutely let them hustle her on. A fourth figure came ghosting out of the shadows to join them. It was dark-shrouded, like the others, but she had enough wit and skill to recognise the man’s build, his moves and his walk. It was the man who’d come to her with the fake letter.

  Suddenly the hurt one, the one who was being carried, began to spasm and buck. The others frantically grabbed at it, but all hope of stealth was gone when it gave a wet, rattling wail and finally went limp. Its carrier staggered for balance under the now truly dead weight, and a moment later there was a double-clap of sound from somewhere behind them. The screams of the guided shells passing over her were gone almost before she heard them, but Ylante would remember the sound of them thudding into the meat of the dead kidnapper’s carcass, for the rest of her life.

  The corpse stopped the shells. The body thudded to the deck as the kidnapper carrying it let it slide off his shoulders. Something passed between the three surviving shadow-figures, and then two of them were returning fire with las-shots and curses that their vox-maskers turned frighteningly flat and metallic. The third stared expressionlessly down at Ylante for a moment, and then disappeared into the dark.

  A thought forced its way up through the pain-fog and into her brain: she had a chance – as much of a chance as she was ever going to have. She managed to get to her hands and knees, as her captor swayed to the side and a whicker of shot shredded the air above and behind her. The racket of the shotguns was infernal, impossible, after the quiet snap of the las-rounds. Ylante looked around, and tested her ankle. She thought she could trust it for a few paces, enough to get her far enough away so that they would have to turn their backs on the Arbites to chase her. If they responded too quickly then she could hit the second one’s knees with her shoulder and maybe she could buy herself a couple of seconds before the las-beam came through her shoulders.

  She thought of Calpurnia, and of what the grim little woman would say to her if they ever met face to face again. That was a problem to look forward to, she told herself, and began to crawl again.

  CHAPTER TEN

  ‘Talk to me.’

  Calpurnia was first down off the glide-truck, shield in place and maul at the ready. Bruinann came behind her at the head of a pack of Arbites, weapons at the ready. The dim expanse of the hangar spread out in front of her. She could see the lamps clipped to the shoulders and shields of Oraxi’s squad, swinging back and forth.

  ‘Three exchanges so far,’ came the lead arbitor’s reply over the vox. ‘Las-fire, maybe some kind of silenced slug thrower, but they’ve gone quiet. I think we’ve pushed them out of whatever position they were trying to hold. Instructions?’

  ‘Bear to your three,’ ordered Bruinann, after Calpurnia signalled him to speak. ‘We’re coming in behind you. Advance pattern scale-two, your lead.’

  ‘Affirm,’ he replied. Calpurnia fell in beside Bruinann as they jogged forwards.

  ‘Rede?’ she voxed, ‘Rede, come in. The lights are coming and going on us. Who’s got control?’

  ‘We’re trying to trace the countermands through the code-channels,’ the detective replied, ‘but we haven’t pinned down the source yet. Someone’s working against us, and they’re getting the machines’ attention better than we are. Their codes are trumping ours. We can fire up the lights, but we can’t keep them on.’ On cue, the overhead arrays clanked, and the haphazard columns of light died away. Calpurnia, Bruinann and their squad lit their own lanterns and formed a line with Oraxi’s squad, spreading out further in the dark.

  A shotgun blasted somewhere to Calpurnia’s right, and she snapped her head around, breathing softly, leaving the vox open for a report. There was another blast.

  ‘Got a–’ came a voice. ‘No, there’s, damn! Quick contact, hard to see. Maybe masked somehow. Don’t think I connected but–’ There was the snap of a las-shot and a burst of yelling, followed by two more answering shotgun blasts. ‘Forward, it’s moving! Bearing right, right of file, ’ware movement!’ The enemy was coming past her. Calpurnia set her grip on her maul and got ready to charge.

  They were almost at the edge of the hangar when Ylante finally recognised the broad square entranceway ahead of her and began to fight in earnest. When the shadowy killers had grabbed her again, she had held herself back, certain that at any moment there would be Arbites to rescue her, and determined to be ready when the moment came. As she struggled along in her captor’s grip, her injured leg throbbing in time to her hoarse breathing, she realised that they were about to enter the Long Dock Road, the passage that skirted the Curtain and connected the three dock assemblies. They were on their way out of the hangar, and the Arbites were getting no closer. Bitter despair gnawed the back of her mind as they closed on the entranceway without a shot, a shout or a light coming after them.

  Then the lights came on. She saw who was holding her, for the first time, and lashed out with bright, wordless terror.

 

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